Of course, Goldman employees are still rewarded handsomely for the work: the bank set aside an average of $109,140 per employee in the second quarter.

So nobody should feel badly about the fact that this is down from $121,111 last year.

But Goldman is not the only Wall Street titan that is starting to pull back a bit on bonuses and salaries.

Citigroup(C), which also reported earnings Thursday morning, disclosed that the bank's second quarter compensation expenses fell 9% from last year.

JPMorgan Chase(JPM) reported earlier this week that compensation expenses at its corporate and investment banking unit were down 4% from a year ago. Bank of America(BAC) said that compensation costs were down at its global markets division too.